One of the curiosities of history was the great game of follow-my-leader, that the whole community used to play. Under the hat of the great man of the village was a brain large enough for the ruler of a nation. He seemed the peer of a Bismarck in executive force. We have had since a high grade of general education but then we had a giant. He had an individuality peculiar and surprising. His mental traits were exceptional. The dominant features of his character were energy, industry, and courage. He was an able, genial, hard-working man, a treasure and a blessing, but giving some evidence of rusty mental machinery and of being belated in the world's history and of absolute inability to train a successor. A modern, typical exhibition of the relation of the big man to the town was given at Three Oaks, Michigan, when Admiral Dewey gave a cannon to the committee that after the Spanish war was arranging a memorial to the dead soldiers and sailors. It was offered to the city that in proportion to its population would make the largest contribution to the monument. Boston, Chicago, New Orleans, and San Francisco all vied with each other. The case turned on the clear swung conception of one master mind. It would never be possible, Mr. E. K. Warren observed, "to rouse all the inhabitants of a large city to give to such a cause," but every man, woman and child in Three Oaks would give a dime or a dollar on condition that he himself gave a thousand times the amount. The people owe a debt of gratitude to such a man, a marked individual specimen of human worth, with a character of his own, who plays the part of fountain to their reservoir. There is a fine reflex influence in being what the New Testament calls "a lover of good men." There is nothing better that can enter the human soul than admiration and reverence for high character. They are the crown of our moral nature. One element in them is appreciation. It was a fine training for boys to show and feel deference. This is one thing that a boy does not bring into the world with him. It is not natural to look up.
Sounds a Characteristic Note
We live in an age of interrogation when all things are questioned, not only as to their right to exist, but particularly as to their right in any degree to rule. Every age has its own lesson and adds its own peculiar gift to those preceding it. Are we better or worse? This only I know that these men were beacon lights to the young, illuminating their path and beckoning them on, and deserve to be enshrined in a perpetual and revered remembrance. From all this there has come a reaction. Congressmen and legislators have not lowered in grade, far from that, as the elimination of the bar from the capital would be one of many evidences, but the public intelligence has risen so that they, relatively, seem to have descended. Instead of a century plant the usual attraction now is a garden. A great social revival has been abroad; the people are getting together. There is now more concerted action. In the business world individuals are forming alliances. Interests are being confederated. As the community spirit comes to consciousness the individuality of men diminishes. Society forms into clubs, chambers of commerce, and into boards of directors in which men are less marked individually and much, even of their personality, is concealed by the extravagant multiplication of societies and institutions and meetings of every kind. The churches have pretty nearly lost the individual, since the introduction of team work, itself a blessing, but the individual has withered. He is leveled down and smoothed out by the necessity of acting only in conjunction with groups.
Some Incongruities of Character
The Arabian Nights would make queer history, yet they would prove a wet fuse and fail to kindle the mind if they did not suggest actual experience. Who is your "old man" that sticks to your shoulders putting you in Sinbad's class? Each village carries its unconventional character. He gives a touch of color to the place. Rip Van Winkle, an old drunkard, who slept for twenty years in the Catskills was a great favorite with the children. They would shout for joy whenever he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings, and taught them to fly kites. He was surrounded by a troop of them. He had a distinct individuality. He was a hero, with all his characteristics well marked. A person on revisiting the earth misses such a striking familiar figure in the neighborhood. We saw Mrs. Van Winkle beat up old Rip with a broom-stick, but although she was a clean, tidy, thrifty person who kept her house swept and garnished in spite of her improvident husband, in the estimation of the boys she was not to her well-known husband a companion character.
"Jack Sprat could eat no fat
His wife could eat no lean."
Young eyes are sharply drawn to persons so dissimilar in their tastes. Children are quick to see that this very difference in taste produced a peculiar situation. Our early life is peopled with distinctive and marked characters and they have gone along with us through life. It is the peculiar outstanding people that, like a burr, stick to the memory.